Sunday, November 30, 2014

So what makes this little random assortment of my Zombicide figures significant? These are the last five figures of my entire collection finally painted! Now, I have to wait for my Season 3 stuff to arrive.

All five of these figures are actually zombivors. I don't play using zombivors -- or, when I do, I simply keep using the original survivor figures. Instead, I chose some of the less "zombified" zombivors and simply painted them up as extra survivors for use in Zombicide as well as other zombie/post-apoc games (All Things Zombie, After the Horsemen, Zed or Alive.)

The remaining figures, I painted up in the gray monochrome and dropped them into the general population. The white ring is to identify these grays as VIP walkers; I figure I'd give them a little extra street cred for having been demoted.

I'm starting to get used to the Vallejo skin palettes I've settled on. My usual style is bright and bold, and it works great for my Zombicide survivors to help them contrast against the monochrome hordes. But I also like a more toned-down, realistic look to figures, and the Vallejo skin palette has helped me tone down some of the other colors as is seen in figure in the center of the photo. I'll try to give both color styles some equal brush time in the future.

Friday, November 28, 2014

Still proceeding slowly, but here's the next of the Rogue Planet figures. The heavy machine gun came out looking a little more steam-punkish than I'd like, but it should still blend in once this figure joins the general population (still needs to be varnished.) The gun was made from cuts of varying sizes of green stuff cylinders as well as pieces of brass rod. The rods look bare in the photo, but they're actually painted; maybe I should consider a different color.

All the conversion work on this figure -- quilted manica, shoulder armor, loin cloth -- were made from green stuff. The rocks on the base were made using some broken up cork.

I have a few more Rogue Planet figure conversions to paint up. They're not difficult to paint, I'm just going slow as real work sucks away my life force (I had to work on Thanksgiving even -- but at least I got out a little early and used that time to paint the bulk of this machine gunner.)

Other stuff

I painted these up a year and a few days ago. Do I want to paint more?

I've been wanting to play some serious Zombicide lately; I'll probably have to go solo for now, but in the mean time, I have the last four figures of my entire collection on the table getting painted. Just a couple survivors and a couple zombivors getting painted up as regular zombies. (Actually, I think they're all zombivors.) I look forward to having the entire collection finally painted up. Only took a little over a year.

Speaking of which, it's been almost exactly one year since I tried a little experiment with some gray paints and a few walkers. I've been thinking about buying another box of walkers just so I can paint'em up all monochrome :)

42mm

I also put down the first payment for a new samurai. Sculpting will start in a few days. I look forward to seeing a finished figure (and painting some more samurai) in a few weeks.

Space Hulk

The Space Hulk stuff is put away for now. I wanted to pick up a copy before it left again for a few years. It will eventually get painted (and played!) I think I will stick with the classic blue/purple skin for the genestealers. I'll be painting the terminators up as Flesh Tearers; I also picked up a squad of Deathwing Death Angels.

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Here's another of my Rogue Planet-specific figures, this one based on my Nyarlathotepic aliens.
He's armed with a gloved/manica carbine and has some unique armor to fit his body, all made from green stuff.

The Rogue Planet figure painting is going a little slower than I had expected; I've been coming home tired from work. But I'll try to pick it up a little here. I work through the holidays, but I certainly have time to paint. I'm actually almost halfway through this batch of 10, so it shouldn't be too long.

In other minis news, I'm close to pulling the trigger on another (42mm) samurai commission with Steve Barber. I've got the pose chosen (hasso no kamae.) I just want to make one more run through the net for some reference photos. The more reference pics I can provide, the easier it is for Steve to sculpt. I'm guessing I'll get a completed figure in a nice area of time before I start receiving a bulk of Kickstarter projects I backed a few months ago -- especially Zombicide and Mercs; there'll be plenty to paint between those two.

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Here is my current group of 42mm (Steve Barber Models) samurai standing on my new display base. There are 60 figures here with space enough for 3 more (not including the space at the top corners where I have terrain elements.) I can also drop another 15 figures along the front on the ground level if I want ... and I do.

I use these for skirmish gaming, mostly using a converted Red Sands, Black Moon ruleset by Two Hour Wargames. I've got plenty of ronin, peasants, ninja, monks, a pair of Edo street gangs, one Zatoichi, and a few representatives of my own little fictional clan. I eventually want to add some figures to represent a rival clan (maybe with the next commission) and maybe a few more monks, but otherwise, I'm pretty satisfied with this collection. There are more than enough for just about any skirmish game. If I had extra money, I might consider commissioning some civilians.

This is actually not the entire collection; I still have my armored samurai bushi, which are still for sale ($400 for the lot pictured below, includes domestic shipping.) Plenty of figures -- enough for a small skirmish (such as in "Ronin" by Osprey.)

Monday, November 17, 2014

My display base can hold around 60 figures on 40mm bases. I left space in frontof the terrace (when it's placed on my shelf) to place another dozen figures.

A few months ago, I took a group photo of all of my 42mm samurai. This week, I realized the collection has grown by at least 20 figures, so it's time to take another group photo.

I also decided it was time to build another display terrace to hold all of those figures. I got everything put together and mostly painted before I realized I should share a quick and simple tutorial. So here you go!

You'll see the whole piece in a later post, when I get a group photo of all of my samurai on it.

Things you'll need

-- Large square of blue foam (I used 24x24" here for a 24" long terrace with 1 3/4" deep levels.
-- Foam cutter or other method for cutting your foam in relatively straight lines.
-- Craft paint: Black, white and a grass green
-- Foam glue (or your preferred adhesive) for gluing the foam together
-- White glue for attaching grass
-- Lots of static grass or flock (Woodland Scenics sells large shakers of static grass.)
-- Optional: I used a metal yard ruler taped to the foam to act as a guide for my foam cutter, so that I could cut long, straight lines.

Doin' it

Yep, just a bunch of stacked blue foam. Measure first!This is the back side, so it doesn't need to look good at all.

This will need some planning on your part. Decide how deep your terrace level will be first, and draw everything out. I stacked my levels solid (no open space beneath any of them,) and I ended up using all of my 24x24" square of blue foam for a display terrace that was 24" long by about 11 1/4" deep (and a half inch thick.)

Your usage will vary with the depth of terrace levels you use. Mine are 1 3/4" deep so that they are large enough to comfortably hold a 40mm base. A 1 1/2" depth will work fine for most 28-32mm figures (easily fitting 30mm bases.)

I'm not going to go into too much detail here, assuming you know how to do basics such as cutting and gluing foam. But cut your foam into the component pieces. All the pieces should be the same length, and the bottom piece should be the widest (widest = measuring front to back of the entire piece.) The next piece up should be 1 1/2" narrower than the bottom piece, and the next piece 1 1/2" narrower than that, and so on, going up.

Make sure everything dry fits nicely, so that you can see that you left ample room for your minis to stand on. Then glue it all together!

Spread some glue and sprinkle some static grass (or flock).

When the glue is dry, apply a coat of paint. I did my base coat in black so that I could follow up with gray (mixing in the white) to drybrush some rough stone work on the fronts of each level. I then painted green where the grass goes. The glue and static grass will cover most of this green undercoat, but it's nice to have in case you miss a spot or two when applying the grass.

After the paint is dry, spread some white glue over every surface you want there to be grass. Then apply your static grass. Let dry. Done! I find it easier to apply the static grass in steps, doing one or two terrace levels at a time. But there's nothing saying you can't do it all at once.

Optional step: Since this is for display and will sit on a shelf, I don't require a lot of strength; if you plan on moving this piece a lot and want a little added strength, after the paint has dried, apply a coat of white or wood glue over the entire piece, especially at the susceptible edges (careful not to leave large drops of glue spilling over.) You can add multiple layers of glue for more strength if you want.

This glue layer helps to prevent your blue foam from chipping if its corners get bumped, by adding a sort of shock-absorbing layer (white glue should dry somewhat flexible.) It doesn't add a LOT of strength, but enough to protect from those minor bumps and drops.

Here are the first of my 54mm (Bronze Age Miniatures) figures converted specifically to play the new skirmish game "Rogue Planet."

The orange on Nyarla (the tentacle-headed figure) started with "rust" color (from the out of production Reaper Pro Paint series -- probably the best quality paints there ever were -- even better than Vallejo.) It was followed up with the Foundry orange and yellow ochre triads.
Nyarla is my favorite; she doesn't have a lot going on -- not a lot of details, but I like her organic form and movement contrasted against the hard metal of the triple-barreled heavy machine gun.

I kept the rifle/sniper woman simple. She got a pair of boots, some hair and a big cape. And to make her slightly more safe for work, I gave her an alien mix of purple and green skin. The colorful skin and big cape were done deliberately: I wanted the figure to say, "Yeah, I'm a sniper and I'm right here, so what are you going to do about it?"

The last figure serves as sort of a transition figure between all of these new ranged weapon fighters and the original melee fighters (some of whom include heavily themed gladiators.) To make things simple with arming the new figures, I decided the main battle rifles ("carbines" in the game Rogue Planet) would be held/worn through an armored gauntlet (manica.) This warrior is one of my basic foot soldiers.

So there will be plenty to come over the next couple weeks. All of the new apocalators are based, primed and ready to paint. I just have to put paint to figure.

Friday, November 14, 2014

Yep, naked sniper, gladiator with a minigun and some tentacle people. Also yes, a finned-head lady with a tail.

Rogue Planet figures are finished being converted. Next up will be fitting them for pins for pinning to bases. After the pins are installed, I'll begin priming. Then painting!

Space Hulk figures are all assembled, including a Deathwing squad I picked up (I'll probably get one more Deathwing squad for the full "Bringer of Sorrow" complement.) The plan is to paint the Space Hulk figures once I've finished painting the Rogue Planet figures, but I'll probably end up painting the random terminator or genestealer as the RP figures progress.

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

So Bryon's friend Andy visited last week, and he brought his Tyranid army among a few other GW odds and ends to paint. I saw that he had some Space Marines, and I asked if he had any beaky marines I could paint -- and he did!

I first got into Warhammer 40K in 1988 (The Rogue Trader days.) My first army was Imperial Guard, but I had a platoon of Space Marines, too. In 1989 or 90, I traded my 40K stuff for my fantasy Empire army (which I still have and has been posted to this blog before.)

Games Workshop's business practices pushed me away in the late 1990s. I've been repainting off-and-on my Empire figures, but I hadn't touched a Space Marine since 1990, until Andy let me paint his. Well, that was fun, I painted a couple up, and they went fast, but the sculpts were crisp and the lines still familiar 25 years and a few incarnations later.

Now, I didn't go out and buy myself a chapter; instead, I went sideways and purchased arguably one of GW's best specialist games ever: Space Hulk. Thank goodness it has only a few minis, but I wanted them protected, so I purchased the Battlefoam tray.

The terminators in the box are Blood Angels, but in my day, I remember the Deathwing Dark Angels, and that's what I wanted, so I picked up the dataslate which has rules for the Dark Angels. Then I went to eBay and bought a squad (+1) of Dark Angels. (The +1 has a plasma cannon which is detailed in the dataslate.)

So here I sit, one week later, $180 spent, and with a 25-year 40K hiatus broken because Andy let me paint a couple beaky space marines. But I'm pretty sure it'll stop there. I have other things to do, so not much extra time or space for more 40K. And if it does go bigger, with say a chapter of space marines, I will name them, in cursing Andy, The 1,000 Dammits. Their color will be Angry Yellow (Bryon and Andy will know what I mean by that.)

(By the way, I am remaining disciplined and have finished quite a bit of work on the Rogue Planet 54mm figures. Still a bit of green stuff work to do, but they're almost ready to be primed. I'll try to get a photo of the pre-primed converted figures later.)

It's the final hours of the Dragon Tides kickstarter. If you ever wanted an officially licensed Bruce Lee figure, this is where to get it. True, there are many "not" Bruces out there already, but it's nice to get one personally endorsed by his wife and daughter.

Oh, and there are also miniatures of Brandon Lee (Rapid Fire AND The Crow versions), Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Donnie Yen, Chuck Norris, Bolo Yeung, Dolph Lundgren, and Jean Claude Gosh Darn! And yes, there are a few more, including cross-over figures from companies such as Soda Pop and Level 99 Games, expansion figures (Kiddo), and a small mob of henchmen for your heroes to fight through.

If the game doesn't interest you, you can also just pledge to add on most of the minis. So go check it out! (Yes, I'm a backer, but even if no one else pledges, there are already plenty of great characters unlocked. I look forward to painting these next year.)

Wednesday, November 5, 2014

Got some more work done on my Rogue Planet figures, especially on my children of Nyarlathotep. I also plan on doing some figures up as lizard people, but those conversions will probably be as simple as green skin and maybe a fin on top of the head or something -- so a classic Star Trek level of creating aliens.

The remainder will be good, old-fashioned human beings, including a historically accurate gladiator with a minigun arm and a rocket pack. You'll see him later.

Tuesday, November 4, 2014

This is my first official Rogue Planet post. I've looked over the rules to get some ideas, and got a good start on things.

One thing about the rules is that they are generic, allowing players to use the mechanics of the game to create their own narratives. For example, a unit (unit can be a group or an individual) could have the attribute "Flyer." But how do they fly? This is up to you; you can, for example, say the unit has wings, or maybe anti-grav boots or (in my case) jet packs.

You can also combine the listed weapons in the game to create new weapons. An example Brent Spivey uses in his rules are combining an axe with a chained blade upgrade to create a chain-axe (chain as in chainsaw, for those not familiar with Warhammer 40K weapons.)
Melee weapons can have power upgrades. These upgrades can be explained as technological or magical as chosen by the player. (Tech or magic doesn't change the rules, only the setting or theme the player is trying to create for himself.)

One of the weapons -- carbines -- seem to be the main battle assault weapon. I've chosen to represent carbines as a weapon held using sort of a glove or gauntlet making the weapons look like extensions of the figures' arms. You can see it in varying stages on the two figures at the bottom of the photo. I'll probably add armor all the way up the arm -- a manica, using gladiator terms. About a third of the new figures will be fitted out this way, to represent my line troops (though, one of these is slated to get a jet pack).

The figures along the top of the photo, from left, are a sword and pistol warrior (what better to represent both sci fi and fantasy), a heavy launcher (missile launchers -- I think?), and -- my favorite -- a machine gun. My machine gun depicts three automatic weapons combined to make a bastard, triple-barrel machine gun. I call it the "Big'un."

I have a figure among my post-apoc gladiators inspired by Lovecraft's Nyarlathotep. I thought this would be a good chance to make a couple more figures converted to his race, hence, the tentacly looking head on the figure holding the Big'un. I'll call her Nyarla, after her dear elder dad.

Saturday, November 1, 2014

I gathered some bits and green stuff and made myself a couple retro-ish rocket packs. The new Rogue Planet game (PDF is out now!) has rules for flyers, and my flyers will be doing so because of their new rockets.

These were easily kitbashed. The boosters come from Hydra Miniatures rocket cycles. The square fins are extra bits from when I converted some rocket cycles from Bombshell Miniatures. Everything else is either plastic or green stuff.

I had planned on adding some techy bits (you can see between the rockets in the second photo, but this made the packs a little too large for the figures. The figures these will go with won't be much different from the prehistoric figures they're being modelled upon. After all, Rogue Planet is Sci-Fantasy. (In the end, the wearers will probably be a little more post-apoc looking than prehistoric.)

Back to reading the rules, which are proving great at giving me ideas for models and conversions (ammo grunt -- I wonder if I can build an ammo-"bot"?)